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Keywords: Parenting

  • AUSTRALIA

    Big broods and helicopter parenting

    • Sarah Kanowski
    • 08 October 2009
    5 Comments

    Big families are no longer fashionable, but they had their benefits. Vastly outnumbered, there's no chance for adults to practice the kind of helicopter parenting common to my own generation, where we hover over our one or two, soothing and solving.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Parenthood as religion

    • Sarah Kanowski
    • 24 July 2009
    7 Comments

    After my first child was born I was overwhelmed by a new appreciation for the work required to grow a single human being. History's catalogue of achievements now mean little to me. Man Walks on Moon? Big deal. Each day the headlines should shout, Woman Gives Birth!

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  • AUSTRALIA

    League tables short-change students

    • Fatima Measham
    • 15 July 2009
    12 Comments

    Studies correlate teacher morale with student achievement, so ranking schools according to student performance may be counterproductive if it hurts teacher morale. Finland has the best education system in the world without resorting to league tables.

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  • RELIGION

    Who deserves charity

    • Susie Byers
    • 14 July 2009
    10 Comments

    The Pope's social encyclical comes at a time when Australian churches increasingly have to provide charity to those who have been failed by the state. For charity to constitute true giving, social organisations must also be prepared to commit politically.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    A farmer's life

    • Gabrielle Bridges
    • 01 April 2009
    3 Comments

    Twins were born in a country town. John lived in the male world of farms and pubs. Jane married an angry patriarch like her father, and unwittingly copied her mother with silence and sedatives. Later she would watch her brother die.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Mem Fox and the parable of the green sheep

    • Sarah Kanowski
    • 13 January 2009
    1 Comment

    Working mums were 'offended' and 'disgusted' by Mem Fox's childcare slam. Other critics berated 'selfish mothers' and a society sick with affluenza. There was one word missing word from all the brouhaha: 'fathers'. (September 2008)

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Modern parents' toy story

    • Daniel Donahoo and Tania Andrusiak
    • 12 September 2008
    4 Comments

    Our children are not our children. They live in a world saturated in brands, commercialism and all manner of hyped-up toys. So when, over a pre-dawn hot chocolate, our son told us he wanted to buy a Ninja Turtle, we just smiled.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Mem Fox and the parable of the green sheep

    • Sarah Kanowski
    • 10 September 2008
    15 Comments

    Working mums were 'offended' and 'disgusted' by Mem Fox's childcare slam. Other critics berated 'selfish mothers' and a society sick with affluenza. There was one word missing word from all the brouhaha: 'fathers'.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Kids or criminals

    • Liz Curran
    • 05 September 2008
    1 Comment

    A 14-year-old boy in a country town has his first gulp of beer in a street. A passing police officer charges him. How is it that the first resort in many cases in Australia is to immerse the child in the criminal justice system?

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Paid leave fans the maternal flame

    • Jen Vuk
    • 02 July 2008
    6 Comments

    Parenting deserves more than a bonus, it deserves to be exulted and supported in its many and varied forms. With so many women in the workforce a paid maternity leave scheme is the linchpin upon which other 'family-friendly' policies depend.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Short changing working mothers

    • Jen Vuk
    • 13 December 2007
    1 Comment

    The leaders' election promises of more child care and tax breaks for private school fees were simply icing on a non-existent cake. And while the baby bonus is undoubtedly a welcome addition to the family purse, it's just that — a bonus. A 'generous' package filled not only with promise but problems.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Keeping families safe from violence

    • Patricia McNamara
    • 17 October 2007
    1 Comment

    Women grieve deeply the loss of female victims to family violence. For these women, media reports often mean an agonised re-working of enormous frustration and regret at having been unable to protect one of their own.

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